


I’m a stray dog now, I won’t beg or bow

by suzukiblu



Series: everybody knows we're just a couple animals [2]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemons, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Blackwatch Era, Blackwatch Genji Shimada, Blackwatch Jesse McCree, Blood and Injury, M/M, Mission Fic, Pre-Fall of Overwatch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-26
Updated: 2018-06-26
Packaged: 2019-05-28 18:27:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15055139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/suzukiblu/pseuds/suzukiblu
Summary: Jesse McCree is the only man alive who’s touched his daemon that Genji hasn’t sworn to kill.





	I’m a stray dog now, I won’t beg or bow

**Author's Note:**

> Decided I wanted to write a little bit more in this ‘verse, so here we are!

Jesse McCree’s daemon is a dog. Genji doesn’t recognize the breed, but it’s obviously a canine and McCree isn’t wild enough for anything undomesticated or a proper predator. 

He thinks this until their third mission together, which is the first time he actually sees Deadeye in action. After that, he starts wondering a little more. 

Genji doesn’t care about much, these days--the parts of him that don’t burn white-hot with rage are nothing but ash and emptiness. McCree’s strange daemon and stranger gun are a distraction, and not one he cares to indulge. He doesn’t care for distractions much at all, anymore. 

He still wonders, sometimes. Not enough to ask anyone or look anything up, but he wonders all the same. 

Too small for a wolf. Too much fur for a coyote. Too lanky, too quick, too clever, too--

Maybe he wonders a little more than he means to. 

Jesse McCree is the only man alive who’s touched his daemon that Genji hasn’t sworn to kill. If he was going to wonder about anyone, it would be him. 

“Him again?” Himari whispers from inside his chest. Ziegler put a comm in there so she can hear and be heard--at least by him--so her voice is sharp and clear in his ear. Ziegler saw the necessity of locking Himari away, with the condition that she’s in, but she thought the comm was just as necessary. Sometimes Genji hates Ziegler for keeping him alive; other times he’s grateful to her, because she is the only one who could’ve given him this chance for vengeance. Because she’s the kind of person who’d build him so his daemon could hide, but also make sure he could always hear her. 

He doesn’t talk to Himari like he used to, but at least he can still hear her voice. 

.

.

.

McCree is cleaning up the training bots Genji destroyed this morning. Genji is aware this is not McCree’s job, but the other does it without fail. McCree cleans up most of his messes, up to and including on missions. Genji is a liability, and he’s aware of the fact he is a liability. 

Blackwatch takes him out with them time and again, though, and McCree cleans up his messes. 

It’s something he doesn’t understand. 

“He has good hands,” Himari says, as if it were the first time someone else has touched her. McCree’d been wearing _gloves_ , for fuck’s sake. 

McCree does have good hands. In another life, Genji might’ve been interested in them. Maybe even interested in the man attached to them, though it’s hard to remember what he’d used to like when he can like _nothing_ now. He feels rage. He feels betrayal, grief, and loss. There is room for very little else. Certainly none for someone else’s hands and what they might or might not make him feel. 

“Look at him,” Himari says, and Genji doesn’t. 

.

.

.

“Where does it hurt?” Ziegler asks. Her hands are covered in blood and oil. Genji can see nothing else. 

.

.

.

“Awful sorry for the trouble, partner,” McCree says, tipping his hat. Genji starts climbing out the window, because that’s been a reliable way of avoiding dealing with the man in the past. He listens to Reyes, obviously, but McCree . . . 

No. Just no. 

“You could just walk away,” McCree points out, leaning out the window after him. Genji ignores him--ignores the closeness of him, the scent of leather and gunsmoke, the broad shoulders filling up the window and the big hands on the sill next to his and the dark and lovely eyes looking down at him--and drops the two stories to the ground. Himari lets out a breathless sound in his chest, and he remembers the days when she would’ve been beside him, diving with reckless delight. It makes him want to kill someone. 

It makes him not want to be around anyone like McCree. 

“His _voice_ ,” Himari sighs wistfully. Genji ignores her. 

He imagines that he feels something flutter in his chest, but of course there’s nothing there left to be feeling anything with. 

.

.

.

The mission goes poorly, they achieve their objective by the skin of their teeth, and McCree is laughing. They’re alive, so Genji doesn’t begrudge him it. He remembers that feeling, he thinks--the feeling of being alive and being _glad_ about it. He’d be glad too, he supposes, if he were more like McCree. McCree seems like someone that someone could be glad to be. 

Genji is nothing like McCree, of course. 

_Shut up,_ he thinks about saying, but doesn’t. Reyes is up front, flying the plane and cursing in pain as O’Deorain puts his brutalized shoulder back together. He probably shouldn’t be flying, but the pilot’s concussed and Genji doesn’t know how and doesn’t know if anyone else here does either. Presumably not, if Reyes is the one in the cockpit. 

“God damn,” McCree says, tipping the brim of his hat over his bloodshot eyes and slumping back against the side of the plane. Genji wonders if Deadeye hurts to use. It seems like it should, but what does he know about “should”, anyway? He doesn’t know anything about McCree, except that for some reason he cleans up other people’s messes. He doesn’t even know what his daemon is. He only knows her name because he’s overheard it. 

“You’re bleeding,” McCree’s daemon says, speaking of the devil. 

“Not that bad,” McCree says. Genji can’t think of a single mission the man _hasn’t_ come back bleeding from. 

“Not you,” his daemon says, and that’s when Genji realizes she’s looking at him. He looks down automatically and finds blood pooling in the cracks between his skin and cybernetics. He usually comes back bleeding too, so he can’t imagine why she chose this time to say something about it. 

. . . _does_ she usually say something about it? 

“You alright there, darlin’?” McCree asks. Genji thinks about slitting his throat, which is an unfairly vicious reaction but is his reaction all the same. Most of his reactions are unfairly vicious now. He wants off this plane. He wants to never be looked at again. He wants to never hear Jesse McCree’s voice again, not for a _damn_ thing. 

He can’t say any of that, obviously, so instead he says nothing. The blood drips down over the curve of his chestplate, and he wonders if any has leaked onto Himari. She’s not saying anything if it has. 

There’s so many words in his throat, and yet nothing he could actually say. 

.

.

.

Genji cleans the blood out of the joints of his fingers with practiced care, then goes and dry heaves into his bathroom sink because _that’s his hand_ , those metal joints and twisted wires and screwed-together pieces, that’s his _hand_. Himari is silent in his chest, and he doesn’t let her out. She doesn’t ask to be. 

There’s nowhere for her in this stark room, anyway, with her crippled little legs and missing wing. Where could she go? There’s a bare mattress and empty shelves and nothing else. 

Genji lost everything he owned when Hanzo and Goro killed them, and there’s nothing he wants anymore. He uses what Overwatch gives him and requisitions replacements when he runs out--of toothpaste, soap, oil, whatever--and nothing else. He never asked for blankets or pillows and didn’t accept the ones he was offered, and he got rid of all the furniture the first chance he had. Someone else can have it. He has this bare room, and the empty compartment in his chest that Ziegler insisted on padding. It’s the only soft thing left in him, and he only allowed her to do it because of the very real chance Himari might die if he fell or got hit hard enough. They can’t die yet. They have vengeance to take. 

They have things to _do_. 

Genji wipes his mouth clean, spits into the sink, and goes back to cleaning the blood out of his joints. 

.

.

.

“Him again?” Himari asks. Genji doesn’t answer her, but that’s nothing new. McCree is sitting on the other side of the hall, hat tipped down over his eyes and chest slowly rising and falling. He might be asleep. Genji can’t imagine how a Blackwatch agent could sleep in a public hallway, but maybe McCree thinks it’s safe here. They _are_ on an Overwatch base. 

Genji can’t imagine ever feeling safe again, no matter where he is or who he might be with. How could he? 

He still has never spoken to this man, he realizes. This man has _held his daemon_ , and he’s never said a word to him. 

What does that say about his life? What does that say about _him_? 

What does that say about Jesse McCree? 

“Your heart’s racing,” Himari says. Genji says nothing to her, because that’s nothing new and because McCree might hear. He doesn’t want McCree to hear either of them. 

His heart is one of the only things Ziegler didn’t need to replace. 

.

.

.

Lupe pads ahead to peek around the corner and Genji has the irrational desire to pull her back into the shadows where it’s safe, as if that were something he could just _do_. He wants to do it, even knowing better. Her tail’s close enough to yank. 

“Clear,” Lupe says lowly, and they keep moving. 

.

.

.

“You’re bleeding,” Lupe says. She’s been saying it more and more often. Sometimes she doesn’t, but almost always, now. Genji doesn’t answer her. He doesn’t even answer Himari most of the time; why would he talk to anyone _else’s_ daemon? 

Admittedly, they’re in a bit of a situation right now. 

For starters, Lupe’s here--but McCree is not. Lupe’s collapsed on her side, breathing heavily, and wherever McCree is he can’t be in much better condition. They’re not separated; he’s never seen them more than thirty feet apart, _if_ that. 

Further complications: they may be somewhat trapped, and Genji can’t get a signal on his comm. They fell down three floors into the basement and it’s frankly a miracle none of them are dead. Lupe definitely broke at least a leg, and his are going to need some serious tune-ups before they work right again. They’re sending little shocky signals that aren’t _quite_ pain to all his transmitters, and it’s very uncomfortable. 

So is being stuck in a borderline-bunker of a basement with someone else’s daemon while they’re hell knows where. McCree and Lupe both screamed when the floor went out and she fell, but that was the last Genji heard from any of the team. He had a glimpse of Reyes holding McCree back before he could risk leaping to his own death, and then everything was broken floors and painful crashing. At least it didn’t hurt as much as it could’ve; if one of them _had_ to fall, it should’ve been him. 

Lupe is a bit more of a problem. 

“Well, could be worse, I reckon,” Lupe says, weakly tucking her nose into one of her legs. The other ones she seems to be trying not to move. “Can you walk, darlin’?” 

Genji has no response for this. He stands up and his legs don’t short out, so that at least works for an answer. 

“Good,” Lupe sighs, then grimaces in pain and closes her eyes. _“Oh--”_

It must hurt, Genji thinks, thinking of the sting of Hanzo’s sword nicking his throat and Goro’s talons closing tight around Himari. To be pulled apart, to be so far from each other-- 

His comm buzzes with static. There might be a voice under it, but it’s hard to tell. Reyes isn’t stupid enough to try shouting in enemy territory, racket already kicked up or not. 

They need to move, Genji realizes, looking around the basement. There are stairs, though they don’t look to be in very good condition. They’re there, at least. 

He looks down at Lupe. She looks so small, curled up tight and painful. He can’t--he doesn’t--

He could leave her--could go and lead McCree back here. It might not be any safer to move her than to leave her here, and no reasonable person could blame him for not touching someone else’s daemon anyway. Of course, Reyes is not always a reasonable person, and they’re also in the middle of a damn mission. 

And she’s hurt. 

“May I move you?” he asks. It’s the first time he can remember asking someone else what they want in . . . in a very long time, he thinks. It’s the first time he’s used his voice in a while too, and it comes out strange and raspy even past the modulator. Lupe blinks up at him, dazed and surprised. 

“Can you?” she says, almost curiously. Genji’s mouth thins behind his mask. He can. It’s not as if--

He can. 

“This will hurt,” he warns her quietly, and leans down to gather her into his arms. She doesn’t protest or resist, though she whines in pain. 

_”Jesse,”_ she whimpers, and it takes far too much strength to keep from tightening his grip on her. Genji’s never cared to wear body armor or tac gear in the field, but he’s regretting it now; he doesn’t even have gloves between his skin and her fur. 

It’s softer than he would’ve assumed. 

If he ever would have assumed, he means. 

He heads for the stairs. 

.

.

.

Reyes is practically carrying McCree, which Genji glimpses only briefly before McCree’s tearing himself away from the man and running straight at him. It takes far, far too much willpower to stand his ground--he’s _not_ being attacked, McCree doesn’t want to hurt him, it’s not--

_”Lupe,”_ McCree nearly keens, jerking to a stop just fast enough not to crush her between them. Genji looks up into his dark and lovely and _pained_ eyes, feels his big hands gingerly trying to reclaim his daemon, and sees no blame or judgement anywhere on him. He supposes that makes sense. McCree doesn’t exactly have room to talk about touching other people’s daemons in emergency situations. 

“Jesse,” Lupe whines, and Genji very carefully helps McCree take her. It’s the gentlest he’s been with _anything_ since--for a very long time. 

Since the obvious. 

Obviously. 

McCree cradles his daemon like she’s the most precious thing alive, a look of relief and gratitude on his face, and Genji watches him do it. In his chest, he imagines a fluttering that he can’t possibly feel. 

He could say something, but he doesn’t.

**Author's Note:**

> [Tumblr!](http://suzukiblu.tumblr.com/)


End file.
